


all the good that you had

by trashyeggroll



Category: Xena: Warrior Princess
Genre: A Good Old Fashioned Amazon Battle Royale, Angst, F/F, Post-To Helicon and Back, Pre-FIN, See chapter notes for content warnings, Sex Tags Will be Added When We Cross that Bridge Ya'll, Slow Burn, Tumblr Ask Box Fic, Varia's Redemption
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-03
Updated: 2020-06-10
Packaged: 2020-10-06 05:00:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 18,288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20501297
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trashyeggroll/pseuds/trashyeggroll
Summary: After Bellerophon's almost-successful attempt to wipe them out, the Amazons withdraw to an ancient stronghold and go to extraordinary measures to rebuild their nation. Their call for help reaches Eve in Chin, reuniting the Messenger with her moms and a certain former warrior queen.





	1. no dawn, no day

**Author's Note:**

> **Content Warnings for this chapter**: Substance Abuse, Suicidal Thoughts
> 
> Received some general requests for Eve/Varia rated E + a question about my headcanon for what happened to Varia after "To Helicon and Back" and _voila!_
> 
> Trying new things with an old, beloved fandom. This first chapter is heavy on worldbuilding, and there is no sex yet.

As a Roman commander, Livia had become something of an expert on Amazons, to the point that her familiarity with their traditions and history rivalled that of most scholars, even if her intent was destruction, not academia. She learned from the generals who’d taught her as a child that it wasn’t enough to defeat an enemy, physically. Once that part was over, you had two choices as victor: put your trust in a hand-selected representative to carry your wishes to the people from the inside, or break down the politics and culture that people clung to in times of crisis. Blasphemy, public executions, and destruction of sacred sites achieved the latter part quite effectively. It unequivocally left obedience as the only option. 

Along the same vein, Bellerophon had almost succeeded in both the first and second part of conquering the Amazons. Though the tribes had survived, technically speaking… what was left could hardly be called a nation. Word passed that the remaining tribes retreated to the ancient, long-abandoned Amazon city Pygela, along the Thermodon River in Persia, and threw open the gates to new recruits for the first time in a century. They’d carried only what could fit on the remaining wagons and in their packs, leaving behind generations of history and culture in their myriad tribal homelands. 

Given the turn of events, Eve wasn’t terribly surprised when a scroll arrived via horseback messenger, asking her to consider a visit to Pygela. The unsigned letter hadn’t been written by Gabrielle—Eve had read all of the bard’s scrolls and knew her handwriting well—but the language suggested perhaps she’d helped with drafting the template, and the unexpected rush of longing at the prospect of seeing her mothers again had the Messenger writing back that she’d arrive within the season.

The fact that they had sent a scroll to  _ her, _ of all people, was intriguing enough; they had to be a particular degree of desperate, and Eve wondered if she’d arrive to the city to find it stuffed full of wandering souls needing a place to sleep, rather than the powerful, proud Amazons she’d fought before. It wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing. The world was changing, and some new minds with new experiences could help the tribes adapt to a post-Twilight reality, one without the protection and guidance of Artemis to shape their sisterhood’s path. 

Or, it risked tearing the tribes—their people, their values—apart, leaving an unrecognizable corpse in their wake. Eve was willing to gamble on it, and whatever they asked of her, she would do to help as long as she could. 

She left Chin by horse-drawn wagon a fortnight later, with her affairs neatly wrapped up in a way that allowed her to return someday, pick up where she left off… but Eve suspected she would never find herself that far East again. The road was long and difficult, testing her survival chops in more ways than one, but within a couple moons, her wagon trundled into view of a massive sandstone city on the river, ringed by impressive, but crumbling walls, and the ant-line of women and children and carts and livestock all heading that way. 

—

“Gabrielle?”

Xena peered through the darkness of their Pygela bedroom, suspecting the pile of blankets on the bed she shared with her bard was obscuring said bard from the light of day. In lieu of poking the sleeping blonde bear, she paced across the room to the closed curtains, keeping her eyes on the lump of furs as she abruptly threw them open. 

“I’m awake!” gasped Gabrielle as she bolted upright in an avalanche of blankets, her short hair sticking up on one side. “I’m awake, mhmm.”

“Eve’s here,” deadpanned the warrior, and she counted to three before Gabrielle reacted, on cue, leaping out of the bed like a deer freed from a trap. 

“Eve’s  _ here,  _ Xena? Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

Choosing to skip over the last question, Xena smirked as she handed her wife a comb. “They’re getting her settled in a room, but we’ll meet for breakfast whenever  _ your highness _ is ready.”

“Oh, stop.” Gabrielle launched a pillow at her head, but it sailed wide to bounce harmlessly against the wall, and the blonde offered no further attitude as she changed out of her sleepclothes and into her queen’s outfit—wolfskin gauntlets and an assortment of decorative pieces affixed to her normal top, including the wide, round pendant that marked her stature. Xena would never admit it, lest the bard never let her live it down, but the post-Twilight version of Amazon fashion on Gabrielle was far and away her favorite. It gave her an excuse to spend a lot of time carefully undressing her wife, and that had never been a bad thing in her book. 

After saving Genia from the Zealots and dropping off Hermes’ Helmet, the warrior and the bard had set off on their typical wandering path, maybe edging eastward, closer to where their daughter travelled through Chin, but the call for Gabrielle to come to Pygela had been desperate and impossible to ignore; the Amazon Nation was near death, and only drastic action would save it. They rode for weeks to reach the city’s walls, and once they arrived to the crumbling city and broken people, there was no leaving. Not with a clear conscience, anyway. The bard served on the Council of Queens, which had had no presiding Queen since Varia’s removal from the post. They ruled by majority instead, even though the seven members of the Council didn’t technically represent specific tribes any longer. The goal would be to eventually hold elections for the seats like the Romans, but first, they had to get back on their feet. 

Having Eve in the city would certainly help, if for no other reason than giving her mothers that peace of mind… but strangely, the thought of settling behind Pygela’s walls, at least for a time, didn’t bother Xena much at all after three whole seasons of it. She and Gabrielle had been wandering for so, so long, and it was becoming increasingly clear that they couldn’t live that way forever. Retiring amongst the Amazons, both of them  _ alive _ and keeping busy with people to help? They could do a lot worse than that. 

The food didn’t hurt, either. Mostly, that there was an abundance of it—venison, boar, and fish from the surrounding lands. Corn, rice, barley, and wheat from Pygelo, the brother village a day’s ride away, and soon, their own farmlands outside the main walls. For Gabrielle, there was an abundance of sweet treats like figs, pomegranates, and grapes. The nearby salt flats meant properly seasoning all that food was cheap, too, and that was Xena’s personal favorite part. In fact, the land, forest, and water were plentiful enough with food that even the rush of newcomers didn’t clear their reserves, removing at least that stressor from the process of growth. The city center’s dining hall, located at the bottom of the Keep where the Queens slept, was almost always full of people, and Xena had seen many women and children go from heartbreakingly thin to strong and robust within Pygela’s walls. At times it seemed that that, more so than a new Amazon army, was the true benefit of this place.

But even that warm, fuzzy feeling of doing good for the masses paled in comparison to the star-bright joy that flooded her heart when Xena set eyes on her daughter for the first time in a year. She was sitting at the edge of one of the hall’s long banquet tables, dressed in that same outfit with green cloak, like she’d never left at all. 

“Mother,” sighed the Messenger, rising from her seat and nearly running into the warrior’s open arms.

Xena’s eyes screwed shut against the tug of emotions as she wrapped her daughter in a tight embrace, overcome with relief. Eve smelled like the cool, minty balms of Chin and the sweaty, musty scent of a long journey, and the warrior was pleased to note her daughter had put some muscle back on her thin frame. The skinnier she was, the more she looked like her  _ other _ mom, Callisto. 

“You look great, kid,” sniffed Xena as she gave her daughter another tight squeeze for good measure. “Chin and Indus kind to you?”

“It was an adventure.” Eve laughed wryly as she wriggled free of her mother’s arms, to fall into her mom’s. “I was ready for a bit of a vacation.”

“Dunno how much peace you’ll find here. I’m just glad you’re safe.” Stepping back, Xena wiped at her eyes as she watched the bard and their daughter embrace, Gabrielle murmuring quiet, consoling-sounding things the warrior couldn’t hear. She hadn’t been sure she’d ever see this, her family together again, and despite the circumstances in Pygela, the old warrior wasn’t sure she could let her daughter go again. Not without finding a really good reason for the Messenger to stay, at least. 

“Let’s get food,” offered Gabrielle, louder, interrupting Xena’s thought spiral and giving her a knowing look. “Talk about what we’ve missed.”

Around mouthfuls of blackened bacon, seeded bread, figs, and, eggs, the trio talked about Borias’ son and the last herd of Centaurs, Zealots and Sappho, and then on into run-ins with warlords in Chin and Persia, thugs demanding tolls on the road, and the woman Eve had almost brought with her from the east. Without saying so in exact words, Xena discerned her daughter had perhaps had her first real love and inevitable first heartbreak while she was away, and she felt sympathy for the way Eve seemed to want to play it off as a non-event, even though she’d been under no requirement to talk about it in the first place. The warrior was sure her wife would pull on that thread later, when they weren’t so giddy with happiness at the reunion. 

“I somehow knew you two would be here. Why didn’t you write me yourselves?” asked Eve as she leaned against the table, looking almost sleepy after their meal. “You know I’d have said yes.”

“And you did say yes, to the Amazons,” Gabrielle offered, proudly. “It was important for the sisters to see that you came here for them, not for us. You’re here to help.”

A smile slowly spread across their daughter’s face, and the Messenger shrugged as she replied, “I guess I did. I would have stayed to help before, if they’d needed me, or wanted me. I owe the sisterhood that much, at least.”

“You don’t owe them anything, Eve, but it is your duty as an Amazon, a true Amazon, to answer a call. That’s what you say if anyone else asks you.” Xena winked, ignoring the eyeroll Gabrielle shot her from across the table. “Gabrielle is on the Council. I advise them on training for new warriors, security for the city.”

“But we need healers,” continued the bard. “And not just for physical wounds. There are lot of women here who left bad situations. We told them that if they got to the city, they would be safe, and they would be taken care of.”

Eve nodded, eyes dropping to her mug of tea before flickering back up to meet Gabrielle’s. “I’ll need to learn more about the beliefs of the women who need help. Do you have any cultural liaisons or advisors?”

Xena gulped her water at the familiar twinge of awkwardness in her daughter’s voice. Those were things you thought about when you’d deconstructed a culture before; Xena the Conquerer had known the methods well, and the Romans had never been shy about them. But it worked.

“We’ll see if we can get you some people to talk to about who’s in the city.” Gabrielle put her hand over Eve’s, biting her lip as her nose wrinkled in a smile. “But first, you need to rest, and I need to show you all the cool stuff I can do as Queen, that your mother can’t. It’s very refreshing.”

“Ha, ha,” interrupted Xena, hiding her smile with her cup as her family laughed, bellies full, and gathered their empty plates. 

—

Hearing that Xena and Gabrielle had arrived in Pygela was like a lightning bolt to the heart for Varia, former Queen, present  _ nothing. _ Though she hadn’t been banished from the city before, due in part to Cyane’s unexpected mercy, if  _ they _ found her here, Varia was sure the Council would find reason to change their minds. Execution could still be on the table, too. 

News of her decisions during the battle against Bellerophon had spread through the sisterhood like Greek fire. She hadn’t  _ just _ betrayed the bard Gabrielle, her friend; Varia had betrayed a legend among Amazons, a Queen with a storied history of fighting alongside other, equally legendary figures like Ephiny and Yakut. A Queen who defeated death dozens of times over, who was powerful enough to ride with a godslayer, and who herself led the Amazons to stop Bellepheron’s genocide. Varia had betrayed the Amazon Nation itself when she agreed to kill Queen Gabrielle, no matter her intentions.

In sum, she avoided Gabrielle and Xena at all costs.

Over the moons,  _ Varia _ became a name spat over mead, hissed in the street wherever she went, and occasionally snarled at her along with a splash from a waste bucket or rotten vegetables and meat. Twice, she’d been beaten to unconsciousness by her harassers—and twice, she curled in the mud to take what was given to her, confident that she deserved it. Each blow was a part of her penance. 

The second attack had been particularly vicious, leaving her with a stiffness and aching in her leg where the bone fractured under a hammer. Teas and poultices didn’t help… but wine did. So did the poppy extract that the healers from Persia and Indus brought to the city, though she no longer got it from them. Once they began to insist that she no longer needed the poppy, Varia got it from a woman who exchanged the extract for whatever people had to trade through a small, unmarked door slot in an unassuming alley. In many ways, the woman behind the darkened doorway was the person she spoke to the most since arriving Pygela. 

According to the work rosters, Varia was assigned to kitchen duty, but the chef of her station had a particularly strong dislike for the shamed queen and either abused her when she showed up or didn’t seem to care when she didn’t. She would make that point clear as she growled over a stockpot,  _ “I just assumed you were dead in a latrine somewhere. It would make me smile. You’re less than nothing here, queenslayer.” _

That was worse than bruises and broken bones, if anything because Varia agreed with the sentiment. She had nothing left; no Marga, no title, no friends, no family. No hope for those last two, as her name and crimes seemed to precede her even amongst the newcomers, who found it easy to rally together around hatred of the former queen. There were days when lying down and just not getting back up again seemed like the best choice.

And it was on one of those days that, for the first time, she knocked on the door to replenish her supply of poppy… but no one answered. She knocked again, and again, and slammed her palms and kicked her toes against the heavy wood. Nothing happened. The windows were darkened by curtains, and no sound came from inside the building. The one thing she’d had left was gone, and the world kept trundling on regardless, wagons and horses and women moving heedlessly around her. 

After that, as she stumbled away with no goal in mind, the pain set in quickly. It began as a stabbing ache her leg, and then a violent twisting of her stomach, and before long, Varia felt as though someone set her skin alight, even as sweat poured down her neck and chest. 

“Watch it, queenslayer,” growled someone as Varia tried to move past her, heady foggy with radiating pain. The stranger shoulder-checked the former queen hard enough that Varia fell to hands and knees, fingers sinking into a pile of warm horse shit as derisive laughter filled the air. 

Panting, she crawled out of the manure and street traffic, until she could laboriously push herself back up to standing by pulling on a brick wall, muscles screaming in protest, bones feeling like they might turn to dust under the tension in her body. But then another shoulder collided with hers, and Varia fell again, the air rushing from her lungs as she hit the hard ground.

_ This is it, _ she thought, eyes closing as boots dug into her side and pressed into her hip; Amazons walking over her. At least not kicking, she supposed.  _ This is where I die. _

There was a modicum of relief in that thought, but it was quickly forgotten as her stomach clenched and her breakfast—mostly wine—heaved its way up and out, onto the ground.

_ This _ would be the end of Varia, once thought to be the strongest Queen in generations, but revealed as nothing a coward and a traitor: Found dead in the street, half-trampled and lying in her own vomit. Perhaps Gabrielle’s perceived mercy on the beach had been, in truth, the worst punishment she could have delivered.

_ And I deserve it. _ Varia went limp, giving herself over to the fire burning up her veins.  _ At least this is finally over. _

For a while, that seemed true. She was vaguely aware of someone rifling through her pockets, and then walking away. She was barely conscious, barely able to understand what was happening when scratchy, loose fabric brushed against her nose, someone clicked their tongue, and then hands slid under her shoulders and pulled.

—

Falling into life in Pygela was simple, almost effortless—there was  _ so much _ work to do that there was really no wrong way to contribute. The newcomers were given a full moon cycle to settle themselves, receive any medical care they might need, and get their bearings in the city. After that, they received a work assignment based on age, existing skills, and Pygela’s most pressing needs.

A huge contingent was dedicated to construction and cleaning duties: clearing debris and reinforcing walls and roofs and aqueducts, building new structures and razing decrepit ones. After that, there was a cascade of support needs, leaving a somewhat worryingly small pool left for security and an Amazon army. The varying levels of skillsets coming through the gates presented a challenge in training, and General Andromeda, a decisive and experienced warrior from the land of camels and sand dunes across the sea to the south, decided to arrange groups of equal distribution of prowess, resulting in average skill level that might be called “ragtag”, but could still confidently fend off most attacks against the city’s walls. 

And with all of that going on, plus the arrivals every sunrise, there was an endless stream of sick and injured pouring into what was once Artemis’ temple, but now served as the city’s healing center. The rolls of elderly and young had already been rocked by waves of illnesses brought in from faraway places, and with the Warrior Princess’ expert help, they’d quickly learned and set up a system for quarantine and sanitation to slow or prevent further outbreaks.

Healing  _ bodies _ wasn’t technically the type of healing Eve was best known for, but she’d undeniably inherited Xena’s knack for the Hippocratic arts. Some days, she seemed to blink, and the time between dawn and dusk had raced past her, unseen. She often slept in the temple’s staff quarters, usually shaken awake in the night for some emergency or another. There were crush injuries and amputations from the builders, cuts and scrapes and the occasional stab wound from the warriors in the practice fields, burns from the kitchens. Plus, babies—dozens of babies per week. She delivered three in the first day after her mother showed her what to do.

Not everyone who walked (or was carried) through the temple doors made it back out, for myriad reasons, but there was one wing of the building that Eve found particularly difficult—the place where those with trouble in their minds lived. Women who couldn’t escape voices like Furies that lived between their ears, women whose bodies had outgrown the capacity of their minds. It frustrated her most of all to not be able to help or comfort these women like those with strictly physical ailments—but she tried her best, and always ensured the kindest, most skilled nursemaids took care of that ward. 

And that was exactly where she found herself walking when one of the orphans who slept at the temple shook her awake in what must’ve been the dead of night. 

“Thea needs you,” the girl had whispered, eyebrows furrowed. “You have to come, she says.”

Blinking against the fog of sleep, Eve swung her feet out from the daybed and gave a testing push before rising to standing, though her muscles and joints protested. She shooed the messenger, who couldn’t have been more than nine summers, back to bed, and pulled a cloak around her shoulders before heading out into the cool hallway. 

When she found the healer Thea, Eve quickly ascertained the problem—a woman thrashing on her bed, snarling as four other nursemaids held her down, a fifth working on tying down one of her wrists. 

“It’s the cursed poppy,” sighed Thea as Eve stopped shoulder-to-shoulder with her. She was a short, robust woman past fifty summers, a feat for an Amazon, and usually one of the most compassionate caretakers in the building. Yet something in her gaze seemed hard as she looked at the patient, and her voice held a hint of uncharacteristic stiffness: “But she’s got some other injuries, and we can’t tend to them until she calms down. I thought you could be of help.”

The Messenger’s brow furrowed, and she took her eyes off the thin, pale patient to question her colleague, “Me? Why me?”

“Well, she knows you, of course.” Thea raised her own eyebrows, giving Eve a sideways look. “Don’t you know who this is?”

“I don’t…” Eve’s voice trailed off as recognition set in, catalyzed by the timbre of the angry curses being slung at her fellow caretakers. Some of them had once been spat in her own face by the woman whose other wrist was being secured to the bedframe, and her identification was confirmed by the deep brown eyes that snapped to meet hers, frenzied and reddened though they were. “Varia?”

Even in the dark of the temple at night, Eve could see that Varia’s dark hair seemed dull, her skin tinged green and rubbery-looking—but there was no mistaking those leonine features, or the expert kicks being directed at the healers as they tried to catch her feet.

“We thought it’d be best for someone not involved in the Bellerophon business to assist,” continued Thea with a sniff. “Unless you think we should get Xena—“

“No, no. Definitely not my mother, or Mom,” Eve sighed. “Does she not have any other friends here in the city? Lovers?”

“I didn’t even know Varia was still alive, to be honest.” The older woman shook her head. “She’s been in and outta here after some axeheads beat her face in, but haven’t seen hide nor hair of her in a long time. Assumed she was dead, until Cyane dragged her in the doors earlier. Thought she might’ve been dead then, too.”

Though she didn’t fully understand why, Eve bristled at the woman’s flippant tone, and she clicked her tongue to get the nursemaids’ attention. “Stop what you’re doing. Stop tying her down.” 

“But—“

“I said,  _ stop.” _ She must have let more Livia slip into her voice than she intended, because the five healers practically leapt backwards, arms up—but it worked. Varia collapsed against the cot, groaning piteously and writhing weakly against the two arm restraints. “You woke me to help, so let me help.”

A strange  _ something _ pulled at her chest as Eve moved forward, slowly kneeling by her… old friend didn’t quite describe them. They weren’t rivals or nemeses anymore, but they hadn’t spoken since Varia had pardoned her from a death sentence. But she couldn’t deny that she felt a connection to the hot-headed warrior, an understanding of burdens and perhaps other, more tenuous things that now was not the time to parse. 

“Leave us,” Eve called over her shoulder as the noises from the former queen began to dissolve into whimpers. When the other women had sufficiently cleared away, incredulous expressions all around, the Messenger cleared her throat and ladled some fresh water into a wooden cup, speaking in a low tone, “Varia, I know you’re hurting right now, probably everywhere. I can’t give you more poppy to relieve it, but if you calm down, I think I can make you more comfortable. Okay? But you have to calm down.”

Whether because of her tone or because Varia knew her voice, the rambling seemed to help. By the time the warrior (or what was left of her) stopped fighting her tethers, she was falling in and out of consciousness, and Eve sighed as she finally reached forward to touch the warrior’s forehead. The skin was clammy, unsurprisingly, and the Messenger assessed her to be fairly far into her poppy sickness, but she was pleased to find a strong, steady pulse when she moved her hand down to her neck. 

It seemed like a lifetime ago that she met Varia, not-yet-queen, in the forests outside her Amazon village. She’d looked more warrior goddess than woman that day, stalking across the forest floor with that red paint across her face and torso, all muscle, swagger, and self-righteous fire. The Varia lying in the bed in front of her was as different from Marga’s second in command as Eve was from Livia. She looked… small. Sunken. Gray. Eve had been brought up to speed on what happened on the shores of Bellerophon’s compound, but the rumor she’d heard most persistently was that Varia had left the city, fleeing her shame. It never occurred to her to look harder. 

In truth, Eve couldn’t bring herself to be mad at Varia for almost killing her mom, and in her estimation, she had more of a right to be angry than Thea or the other nursemaids, none of whom were out fighting and dying on that beach. At least Varia’s intention had been good—sacrifice one to save many. An impossible choice, but easy to judge after the fact.

“Varia,” she said, gently. “Varia, if I untie your hands, will you stay still for me?”

The whine she got in response seemed agreeable enough, and she put down the cup to undo the leather straps, frowning at the angry red grooves they’d left in Varia’s skin. She rubbed them with her thumbs, watching her patient’s gaunt face relax slightly, and then picked up a clean cloth to dip into the water. Carefully, she wiped away the layer of sweat, muck, and blood coating Varia’s face, neck, and arms, exposing fresh and half-healed cuts that she treated with a poultice to prevent infection as she went.

The attention seemed to soothe the former queen, and she risked the moment’s peace to lift Varia’s tunic to check for further injury. A huge bruise, possibly several merging into one dark mass, covered one side of Varia’s ribs, all the way down to her hip, and Eve winced in sympathy. Her patient was in for a difficult recovery, in more ways than just this.

Trying not to jostle Varia too much, Eve managed to tug off her manure-crusted trousers with no protest, then pulled the woven blanket up over her sleepshorts. They would give her clean clothes when the laundry wagon arrived in the morning, probably just a few candlemarks from now, but she was at least clean and—

Varia rolled to one side and retched, loudly, the splash of vomit hitting the marble floors making Eve’s stomach tighten, and then the once-great warrior was groaning again, clutching her stomach and rocking side to side on the cot.

Quietly, Eve got another cloth to wipe her face clean, worriedly noting Varia had heaved up nothing but stomach bile. She reached into the small leather bag she carried whenever she was in the temple until she found the sprig of mint she’d gotten from the kitchens, holding it up to Varia’s cracked, bloody lips until they opened. 

“This will help with the taste from the vomit, and your nausea,” explained the Messenger as Varia weakly chewed the leaves. “You’re not quite through the worst of your sickness, but… we’ll do what we can. Do you think you can swallow tea?”

“Yeah,” croaked the patient, weakly enough that it was difficult to believe, but when Eve returned to the bedside with a cup of turmeric and ginger tea, Varia did manage to sip about half of it before turning her head away and sinking back down to the cot. 

Sighing, Eve pulled the blanket up to Varia’s shoulders again, frowning at the feel of the fallen warrior’s body shivering. She hadn’t gotten any indication Varia registered who she was yet, despite Thea’s assumption the familiarity would help, and perhaps that was for the best, in her opinion. An agitated, confused Varia was no one she wanted to tangle with ever again, no matter what shape she was in. 

Still, Varia had responded to her, in a way—there was  _ something _ of that powerful warrior she knew within the frail woman before her. The one that had sauntered into the hut way back when, smirking and bragging, flexing unsubtly as she showed off her battle scars. Who united the tribes and, despite her subsequent mistakes, had rebuilt the Amazon Nation on the strength of her will and the magnetism of her leadership. It seemed a shame to squander that greatness on judgment of her worst day—but perhaps Eve had a personal bias in that area. 

Regardless, she pulled a more comfortable chair to the side of Varia’s cot, set a clean chamber pot near the former queen’s head, and decided it was time to return the favor Varia had once granted her: Redemption. 


	2. i'm always in this twilight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While Gabrielle contends with the less exciting side of her royal caste, Eve stumbles into a mystery.

Leading an attack, passionately arguing civic and personal philosophy, doling out just punishments: These were queen duties that Gabrielle could handle. She didn’t particularly _ enjoy _ the last one, but the “just” part of it was key when it came to earning the trust of newcomers expected to follow their laws… so she could handle it when needed. 

What she _ couldn’t _ handle was talking about budgets. It felt like letting a harpy scream directly in her ear, a stream of numbers and arguments about how changing something over here would either hurt or help the numbers over there, on and on forever. She could keep interest for as long as they were discussing how best to convince the citizenry to switch from a trade-based system to one using currency, but once Queen Shayla opened her giant, leather-bound ledger book, Gabrielle had to mentally tag out, or she would fall asleep.

Like with their laws, a currency system would require trust, first and foremost. Trust that, without fail, they could walk into a shop with Amazon coin and purchase something roughly comparable to the stated value of their coins. Most of the vendors who’d set up in Pygela were well versed in currency and happy to share feedback about their favorite systems, but the Council was wary of taking _ too much _ advice from the very people who would profit from an imbalanced system. A philosopher who’d crossed the sea from Alexandria offered counsel to balance out the merchants’ desires, and a metalworker from Anatolia was working on designs. 

“Queen Gabrielle? Your vote?”

The bard’s head snapped up to meet Queen Cyane’s questioning eyes, her brain desperately trying to recall anything that had been said over the last five minutes. It came up with nothing. “Hm? Yes?”

Cyane blinked slowly before venturing, “Yes… to using the gold standard, or yes to silver?”

“Gold sounds nice,” was all Gabrielle could think of next, trying to knit her eyebrows to look serious and informed. She was, in fact, neither. 

“It’s unanimous, then,” Shayla went on, scribbling the results into her ledger. “Now all we need is… a lot more gold. And to convince everyone we have it.”

A collective groan rose from around the long table where the Council conducted business, high in Pygela’s Keep. The stone and metal of their surroundings was a far cry from the last Council’s accommodations, a warm, pelt-laden room in the forest. Almost all of the women who’d stood in that circle were now dead.

Gabrielle swallowed that line of thought, shaking her head a few times as the other queens continued the discussion. They worked well together, with most of the membership derived from the warriors who’d survived Helicon, but there was still the occasional conflict in the weight of each woman’s words. While Gabrielle knew _ her _ words were always carefully considered, the other queens were of varying ages and experience in battle, and too much of their meetings were spent waiting for the women to get posturing out of the way.

Mercifully, they soon agreed to end their day’s meeting, and Gabrielle had to stop and stretch when she got up from her chair, her muscles having stiffened from the candlemarks spent on her backside. Her brain felt even worse, but she managed to make her way back to her quarters without getting lost in the stone maze of the Keep. She’d been the one to suggest settling down to Xena a lifetime ago, almost literally, when she first brought Eve to the Amazons to receive her Rite of Caste—except, Pygela itself wasn’t exactly what she’d had in mind. It was nice to look out the window of their bedroom, dry and warm, during the cool downpours that frequently blew in from the sea, but there were also nights where she and Xena snuck to the top of the wall protecting the city to sleep under the stars, for old times’ sake. She missed the freedom of that life and had to keep reminding herself that the downside had been fairly constant danger during their years on the road. Not that Pygela was one hundred percent safe, either. 

After changing out of her buckskin queen outfit and chest piece, Gabrielle wandered out to find Xena. The warrior wasn’t dining, she wasn’t in the library—unsurprisingly, the bard found her in the training yards, teaching spear technique to a young woman, maybe seventeen summers. The poor thing could barely keep the long weapon level, but Xena had her patient face on, and even though Gabrielle couldn’t hear what she was saying, it looked like a pep talk. 

While Xena had always been a natural leader, with people gravitating to her like moths to lamplight in search of direction, the warrior princess had never _ enjoyed _ teaching as much as she did after Eve came along. Xena the Conqueror had been a seeker of destructive knowledge and skills, but it’d taken a long time for the new Xena to accept that the things she taught people could potentially be used for harm, and to a degree, that was outside of her control. Showing young, new Amazons how to defend themselves was an easy cause for Xena to take up when she wasn’t allowed at council meetings, unless invited. 

The teenager managed a pretty decent disarm move, and then someone stepped up beside Gabrielle, and she tore her attention away. 

“Xena’s become a fine instructor,” said Cyane, crossing her arms as she watched the warrior princess and her pupil. “The young ones speak quite highly of her.”

“She’s got lifetimes of experience,” replied Gabrielle with a smile. “What’re you doing out here?”

“Speaking of students of Xena, I thought I should tell you something.”

The bard turned to face Cyane at that, her eyebrows rising. “That’s cryptic.”

“Sorry, I… I’m not sure it’s going to do anything.” The young queen offered a small smile, and then huffed before continuing, “Some days ago, I found Varia in the street.”

A chill ran down Gabrielle’s spine, sprouting goosebumps along her skin. “Found her? As in, dead?”

“No, no.” Cyane waved her hand as if physically banishing the thought. “Well, almost. She's been smoking poppy. Looked frail, gray.”

“I didn’t even know she was in the city,” murmured Gabrielle, flashing back to the beach. _ You are no longer Queen. _“Why are you telling me this?”

She didn’t intend for the question to come off as mean as it did. Once far removed from the death and horror of Helicon’s beaches, Gabrielle had had the space to cool off about Varia’s choice, and if she was being honest with herself, she understood it to a degree. But something still curdled in her stomach at the very thought of the once-promising queen who’d surely have killed her if not for Xena’s intervention. 

Cyane put a hand on her upper arm. “The healers tell me it is her mind, as much as her body, that needs attention.”

Gabrielle couldn’t stop the heavy sigh that escaped her at the implication, lightly-delivered as it was. She took a moment to gather her words, aware of what she’d say to herself in this situation as an outsider, but also having been the one who was wronged. So all she got out was, “I’ll think about it.”

They both looked up at a loud _ thump, _and Xena was waving innocently at them, the spear behind her back, as the young warrior picked herself up out of the dirt. 

—

At first, Varia just assumed she was dead. The last thing she remembered was boots on her back in the mud, so obviously, she was dead and living in some strange inter-world, floating in nothingness, to be eternally punished for her betrayal of a sister. 

Except she wasn’t, and that became clear when she was suddenly aware of a splitting headache, which meant she had a head _ to _ ache, and couldn’t be dead. It wasn’t long after that Varia started hearing voices, not like the Furies, but overlapping words, like many people speaking quietly at once. She heard screams, too, and pained moans. The sounds of the sick and the dying. That made the prospect of foggy nothingness sound like a better idea, but there was no going back now. 

At the feel of water flowing over her skin, Varia opened her eyes, squinting as they adjusted. 

“Good morning,” said a voice from somewhere above her head. “You’ve returned.”

It was a nursemaid, signified by her absurd white hat, which had three tall peaks. The old woman moved around her field of vision, and Varia saw that she carried a bucket of water and a cloth. If she’d been able, the former queen would have kicked the bucket out of her hand, feeling _ less than _ uninterested in being bathed like a baby by a stranger. 

“Oh, I see you seething—hate to break it to ya, but this isn’t the first bath I’ve given you. My name is Thea.”

Varia opened her mouth, intending to say her own name, but her tongue was dry and her lips cracked and painful. She only managed a groan.

“I know who you are, Varia,” said the nursemaid coolly, her expression shifting from a smile to a neutral, inscrutable look. “You’re malnourished and at the end of your sickness. Be patient, and we’ll get you back on your feet. You can do with your life what you will, after that.”

The ending tone of her voice wasn’t exactly kind, and Varia let her eyes flutter closed again, resigned to her humiliation as the old woman rubbed a wet sponge across her arms. She could only hope that if someone was going to take advantage of this state and end her shameful story once and for all, they’d do it quickly. 

“The queens used to talk about you like you hung the moon and read our redemption in the stars,” Thea went on, regardless of Varia’s closed eyes. “And I think you made a choice that went against everything we stand for, besides being plain stupid. You might think the best thing you can do is put yourself in an early grave, but I’d rather you stand up and start making amends. We don’t get to say when or how people forgive us, but we still owe it to those we’ve wronged to work towards it.”

Varia sighed, but it came out more like a groaning wheeze. A punitive afterlife indeed. 

“But what does old Thea know about _ legendary _ warriors and their blood spats? I’ve only been sewing you lot up for longer than you’ve been alive…”

As the nursemaid went on, lifting the blanket covering her body as she rambled and scrubbed, Varia opened her eyes again and managed to turn her head to one side. She was in the temple, and there were bedrolls of people from wall to wall. The room didn’t appear to house the bloodiest patients, but it smelled like urine and sweat. That, more than anything, felt like inspiration to get her body working again. She wiggled her toes and fingers, tested lifting each limb while Thea fussed, admonishing her to stay still. 

By the time the old nursemaid was done, Varia had fully rolled to her side, though it left her panting and red-faced. 

“Don’t make me tie you down,” growled Thea as she stood with her bucket. “If you get up before you’re strong enough, you’re going to fall, and then you’ll hurt yourself worse. Hear me?”

Varia wouldn’t admit it (if her voice had been working), but she couldn’t have even pushed herself to sitting. She was _ exhausted, _ and she gave Thea a dutiful nod. 

“See that? Your first step towards not being such an arrogant ass, hmm?” 

The former queen passed out before being able to react to that. 

—

It wasn’t uncommon for one or both of Eve’s mothers to be troubled by some Amazon problem or another most evenings, but the Messenger could tell that Gabrielle was more perturbed than usual as they ate dinner, her green eyes locked on her plate as she chewed slowly, as if in a trance. Xena was off commiserating with her trainees for the meal, and it left Eve feeling responsible for sorting whatever her mom was going through, perhaps seeing if she could help. That was her understanding of what good daughters did, anyway; she was still new at this. 

“Is there something troubling you?” she asked after a gulp of wine. Eve frowned when Gabrielle didn’t seem to hear her, and she put a cautious hand on the bard’s forearm. 

“Hmm?” The blonde blinked a few times and seemed to finally come back to herself. “Sorry, Eve. What did you say?”

“Just wanted to know what’s taking up so much space in your mind tonight. It seems to be weighing heavy on you.”

Gabrielle nodded, exhaling slowly through her nose. “Did you know Varia’s in the city?”

Before she could stop it, Eve winced, and she could tell that her mom instantly knew what it meant. “I didn’t think you’d want to hear it.”

“I don’t… I don’t _ hate _ Varia. I don’t take pleasure on hearing of her suffering. Cyane said she’s in a bad way.”

“That’s why I kept it to myself,” sighed the younger woman, pushing the remnants of her stew around the bowl. “You’ve already got so much to deal with.”

“Have you spoken with her?”

Eve dropped her eyes. “No. She’s so weak. I think seeing my face would just make her upset again. A reminder of what she’s lost.”

When she looked back up, Gabrielle was considering her with an intent, curious stare, but she quickly wiped it away as she said, “Well, I’m not sure I want to see her, either. Wouldn’t I just make things worse, too?” 

“Probably.” Eve shrugged. “But I think your forgiveness would be life-giving for her. She’s a good woman, despite everything. I think we both know that. Once she’s stronger, I think it’d be good to have a visit from you.”

As someone who’d once almost been put to death by Varia, Eve nevertheless genuinely believed in her. Xena had thought the sentence outrageous of course, and it wasn’t that Eve _ wanted _ to die… but she couldn’t see a way that she could ever make up for killing Varia’s sister… or Joxer… or the Amazons, who she’d nearly wiped out, like her mother before her… or the thousands of Eli’s followers she’d directed her troops to slaughter… Eve’s stomach clenched with a wave of achingly familiar, unavoidable guilt and shame.

“I want to be angry with her, but I… I know what anger does to the soul.” Gabrielle stood, clearing her plate and looking pensive. “I’ll think about it.”

After watching her disappear into the crowded hall, Eve cleaned up her own place and wandered out into the city, pulling the hood of her shawl over her head. She took the long way back to the temple, strolling past street vendors, people sleeping in doorways, and houses with windows glowing orange with warm firelight. The Amazons had yet to demand the departure of boys and men from the city, though it was _ strongly _ encouraged in the form of poor treatment by original tribeswomen, especially the ones who had weathered the pain of giving away a newborn son; _ why should these newcomers be spared that show of dedication to the cause? _That was the common thread of argument. It felt hollow to Eve, but then again, until recently, she’d never had a parent at all, and by Eli’s grace, no children. Luckily, she was nowhere near in a position to make or enforce such a decision. 

She arrived back to a quiet temple, and after freshening up in her room’s wash basin, Eve went to check on the various wings of the building, out of restlessness more than anything. All was quiet as she paced from chamber to chamber, though Eve occasionally stopped to give sips of water to the ill and injured who called to her.

When she got to the area holding Varia, the Messenger paused, almost deciding to turn back and go to bed… but she took a deep breath and compromised, risking a peek into the chamber. 

At first, Eve didn’t understand what she was seeing, but then her warrior’s instinct kicked in, and without hesitation, she grabbed a nearby pair of shears, used to cut dressings, and launched them across the darkened room. A cloud of feathers floated into the air as the metal cut through the pillow being held against Varia’s face, and the person who’d been pressing it down jumped back, startled, as the pillow stuck to a nearby column, pinned by the shears. Varia gasped for breath, writhing on her cot—but alive. 

There weren’t any weapons in the temple for obvious reasons, so Eve sprinted at the masked intruder regardless, unbothered by the potential for her enemy to have a blade or other sharp object. They were wearing a traditional Amazon’s mask, carved in the shape of a boar’s head and ringed by black feathers—and as she approached, they turned and ran, darting between rows of the ill, overturning basins, and kicking supplies all over the floor. 

Before Eve’s outstretched hand grasped her leather tunic, the attacker leapt out a window, and the Messenger stopped, unsure if reinforcements might be waiting in the dark below. Her adrenaline was surging, and she hurried back to Varia, finding the former queen panting and covered in sweat. Her eyes were wide, almost unseeing with panic, and Eve had to take hold of Varia’s wrists to stop her from punching her when she got close.

Thankfully, Varia seemed otherwise unharmed once Eve got the chance to look her over. It was a strange choice for a quiet kill—the former queen was clearly weak enough to pass quickly from a slit throat. In her prime, Varia would’ve easily been able to rip out of Eve’s arms, but tonight, the Messenger could _ feel _ the difference in the once-powerful warrior, weakly pulling at her grip. 

Eve looked down as Varia’s muscles relaxed, her hazy brown eyes half-closed as she lay with her head in the crook of Eve’s elbow, her shoulders on the Messenger’s thigh. She let a long silence pass, catching her own breath and letting her pulse calm in the stillness of the night. 

“Who’s trying to kill you? And why?” she eventually wondered aloud, idly working out a tangle in Varia’s dark hair. 

The former queen’s eyes opened in response to her voice, and Eve almost recoiled, but then Varia muttered something that sounded like, “You again?” and seemed to lose consciousness. 

Carefully, Eve slid out from under Varia’s shoulders, making sure her blanket was straightened and pulled up, then moved out of sight. She couldn’t handle all that—not right now. Instead, she tracked down some patrolling city guards and had them post in the chamber until further notice. And _ yes, _ they could double check that with Queen Gabrielle; Eve was confident her mom would back her up, even if she questioned her later. 

She would tell her mother of the incident in the morning, Eve decided. There was nothing more to be done tonight. But when she put her cheek to her own pillow, seemingly such an innocuous thing, the attack loomed large in her mind. Perhaps they had wanted it to look like a natural death, by using the pillow. Who, besides Gabrielle, would want to kill Varia? The bard would never order a hit—that wasn’t even a question. Plenty of Amazons hated her to the point of being willing to come to blows with the former queen, or so Eve had heard from the nursemaids, but this was a targeted, intentional attack. By the time the sun was peeking through her window, Eve hadn’t gotten single candlemark of sleep as hundreds of possibilities floated through her pounding head. 

To make matters worse, her mother heard about the attack before Eve could tell her. Xena came charging down to the temple, and the Messenger could hear the warrior before she saw her. 

“You’re coming to stay at the Keep,” was the first thing out of Xena’s mouth when they finally approached each other in a hall. “This temple is _ completely _unsafe. Look at it, not a single lock in the place.”

“I can take care of myself, Mother.” Eve crossed her arms as twin sets of ice-blue eyes locked. “And they weren’t after me, anyway.”

“Not _ yet,” _growled the warrior princess. “But what about the next one? What about a night where you’ve had a little too much mead, and you don’t see the shadow in your room until it’s too late?” 

“You’re catastrophizing.” 

“What’d you call me?”

Eve blinked, confused for a moment, until Xena’s frown melted into a soft smile, and she had to laugh at the poorly formed, but well-timed joke. The taller woman wrapped a long arm around her shoulders, squeezing as she planted a kiss on Eve’s head. 

“I worry because I love you, kid. There’s a lot of people we don’t know in this city, and more and more are going to find out who you are.” 

Patting her mother’s back, Eve replied in a kinder tone than before, “I know. But I’m doing a good thing here, and that… that’s what I _ need _ in my life right now.” 

After a long sigh, Xena’s shoulders loosened, a physical manifestation of her words, “All right, you win. But I’m putting more guards on the temple.”

“You mean, _ Mom _ will put more guards on the temple.”

“Ha, ha,” groused her mother, disengaging from their hug with a huff. “By the way, why didn’t you tell me that Varia was here in the first place?”

Eve tensed, unsure of how to approach that question. Her mother had spoken of Varia with less hostility than Gabrielle in the time since Helicon, but the Messenger was still wary of Xena’s tendency to want to force reconciliation, rather than waiting for the right moment. Varia was in no shape for that, and she wouldn’t be able to escape, either. She preferred to put Gabrielle in front of the former queen before her fiery mother, and this threatened to ruin that plan. 

“You know I still care for her wellbeing,” continued the warrior, her expression genuinely concerned. “I can _ help _ her.”

“Only Varia can help Varia right now.” Eve shook her head. “And do you really think she wants you to see her when she can’t even sit up by herself? The great Queen Varia, peeing in a bedpan!” 

Xena sighed, hands coming to rest on her hips. “Well, have you talked to her? Told her she has friends, that care about her?”

Her mother had that classic scheming look of hers, and Eve put a hand on her shoulder. It felt like guarding Varia from her mothers, but if the Messenger could claim expertise in anything other than death, it was spiritual healing. “She needs time, some stability, a lot of sleep. If you care about her, give her that. She’ll need support, once she’s ready to accept it.” 

Though Xena didn’t seem entirely convinced, she gave a curt nod and said her goodbyes, ending in traded kisses on the cheek. Eve went back to her duties.

—

While the walls of Pygela, once rebuilt, could fend off the largest armies in existence, they also trapped its citizenry between stone and sea. The Queen’s Council insisted on thorough documentation for every entrant to the city, but there were many opportunities to… circumvent the official record. No one would be able to say differently to a fake name, for example. And once inside the high walls, there were ways to remain in the shadows. There was so much going on otherwise that the pockets of blacket market activity and criminal havens went largely unnoticed, most days.

In the same way that the Amazon Nation worked to fill the vacuum left by the mass death of its greatest leaders, the new city’s underbelly warred to establish who would dominate the other side of life in Pygela. At times, it spilled over into violence between opposing factions in the streets, and those were the days that the city guards definitely took notice. Combat was usually quick, but brutal, and those who walked away from it needed to flee the scene as soon as the last enemy fell. 

For Iphis, an Amazon from the Northern Greek tribe, moving through the city that way felt closer to home than anything else in the stone maze of Pygela. She’d sprinted across rooftops like tree canopies, disappeared into the city’s catacombs like seeking a night’s shelter in a cave. But the fall from the temple’s window had painfully impacted her ankle, now swelling like a gourd, and she was reduced to limping through dark alleyways at ground level, keeping her head down as she passed groups of patrolling guards. If they were concerned for her significantly affected gait, none said a word.

By the time she reached the culvert leading to a locked iron gate and the sewers beneath the city, the young Amazon’s injured leg was completely useless, and she could barely draw the breath needed to give a staccato, high-pitched call mimicking a storm petrel. It echoed down the tunnel, and to her relief, a silhouette emerged from the darkness within seconds, accompanied by the gentle clinking of keys. 

“What happened?” growled the gatekeeper, Caenis, as she unlocked and opened the grate. Water trickled beneath their boots, smelling of rotten vegetables. 

“I was interrupted.” Iphis hobbled past her comrade, waiting for the taller Amazon to lock the gate and lead her back into the tunnels.

They walked for several minutes, turning down a well-known, winding path until they came to a larger chamber where multiple aqueducts converged in a wide pool. A wooden ship sat in the middle of it, tied by heavy rope to the walls, and lit with orange torchlight. Iphis allowed herself to sink into a kneel as Caenis pushed off the raft they used to get from the outer walls to the larger craft, with the gatekeeper pulling them along a taut guide rope. When they bumped the side of the ship, Iphis grasped Caenis’ shoulders and let herself be carried up the side ladder, groaning as she was unceremoniously deposited on the deck. 

A chorus of whistles and birdcalls went up around them, and their fellow Amazons emerged from the shadows and the lower compartments. Comprised of mostly women from the now-extant Greek tribes, their group had been christened the Tretolmecs by the city guards, a reference to the original peoples who eventually came to be known as the Amazons. It was fitting, as all of their membership were actual sisters, ones who’d been born to Amazons and grew up in tribes.

They gathered as Iphis caught her breath, and then heavy footsteps prompted the crowd to part like water around stone. Their leader was an older warrior, well past her fiftieth summer, a battle-tested, ruthless strategist, and she seemed to understand what had happened—failure—before the would-be assassin reported such.

“Oteri,” greeted Iphis, declining her head in respect. “I was interrupted in my mission. Varia lives.”

“You’re hurt.” The older Amazon had short, white-gray hair and dark eyes, almost completely black. It gave her a somewhat otherworldly appearance that Iphis found mildly discomitting in close quarters, but Oteri was as patient a leader as she was experienced. “Who stopped you? A nursemaid?”

“No, they weren’t there. It was just some woman, not even a guard, and she threw a pair of shears at me like a warrior, came at me to attack with her bare hands.”

Oteri tilted her head, and then instructed the other Tretolmecs to return to their stations, squatting on her toes to speak in a lower tone to the injured Amazon: “It wasn’t Xena?”

“Not Xena,” confirmed Iphis without hesitation. She had seen the warrior princess in the flesh too many times over the last few months to make that mistake. “But she had blue eyes, pale skin, dark hair. Shorter.”

After a beat, Oteri hissed: “The Messenger. Xena’s daughter. I heard she was in the city.”

“Didn’t Varia try to kill her?”

“More than once.” The older Amazon stood again, lacing her hands behind her back as her brows knitted and her voice took on a distracted quality. “I’ll have the healer come find you, Iphis. We need to know more about why the Bitch of Rome would rescue that swaggering buffoon.”


	3. three ghosts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Varia reacquaints herself with life outside the temple... and three important ghosts from her past.

“One more. Just one. C’mon.”

“Fuck you, Thea.”

“Don’t be a child.”

_ “Fuck _ you,” snarled Varia again, if for no other reason than it made her feel better as she forked the last chunk of venison from the flat metal plate and into her mouth, chewing with a gusto she hoped read as sarcastic to her steward. 

“Meat to rebuild those muscles the warriors used to giggle about,” the nursemaid teased, with a self-satisfied grin. After weeks in her care, Varia still wasn’t sure if the old woman hated her not. “A girl of ten summers could kick your ass right now.”

The former queen just glared as she let her fork clatter to the plate. “I bet I could kick  _ your _ ass.”

“And here, people are wondering why someone tried to kill you.”

Varia’s petulant mood deflated. As much as her previous self had wallowed in piteous expectation of an impending death, the reality of it—and  _ smothered with a pillow _ like a decrepit matron—had been something of a revelatory moment. 

So had the news that Eve herself saved her life. Thea and the other nursemaids had refused to tell her much about the attack, but she’d managed to convince one of her neighboring patients to spill the details. The name had hit her like an arrow through the chest, and something in her mind seemed to reignite, the dying ember of a fire catching light on newly fallen leaves. She lurchingly remembered a night shivering and confused, under assault by biting pain in her wrists and ankles—tethers—and a familiar voice.  _ If you calm down, I think I can make you more comfortable. Okay? But you have to calm down. _

That left her even more confused. Obviously, she and the Messenger weren’t anything near friends, but… the thought of a face she knew struck her as deeply comforting. Hades, she’d face Xena and Gabrielle just for the whisper of a connection to a better, previous life. But none had visited her, and the hurt that bloomed in her chest… Varia didn’t understand it, where it came from or why her traitorous brain felt it at all. So, naturally, she bottled it away as best she could, for later examination. Perhaps in the afterlife. 

“You’re actually doing quite well, I have to admit.” Thea’s voice took on a stiff tinge. “But what are we going to do, with a killer after ya? Can’t turn you loose in the streets again.”

“Aw, I didn’t know you cared.” Varia curled her lip.

“Don’t be dense,” snapped the nursemaid, smacking the younger woman on the shoulder with her collapsed hand fan. “I don’t wish  _ any _ sister dead. But more importantly, whether you like it or not, your name and heartbeat seem to matter to someone enough to want you gone. I’ve been an Amazon long enough to know when the Fates are sending signs.” 

_ Has to be an established Amazon after ya, _ Thea didn’t say, but Varia could hear the implication. That was certainly a troubling thought. Not that that type of big picture threat was Varia’s problem anymore, aside from her personal safety. She couldn’t even clearly picture what “cause” might benefit or be disadvantaged by her death; Queen Varia had been  _ something _ of a reformer, though perhaps more swift to brutality than her predecessor.  _ That _ Varia had united the dregs of the Amazons in a brief, joyously ignorant time of hope… and then she’d let them nearly get wiped out again. So it was likely best to let that Varia sleep. 

So to Thea, she just sniffed, “I’m not staying here a day longer than I need to.”

“Like you have a choice otherwise, pup.” Thea whacked her again, and then stood. “Actually, since you  _ are _ doing so well, I thought you could handle a visitor.” 

Maddeningly, the first name to pop into Varia’s mind reflexively fell from her lips at the same time, “Eve?”

That seemed to take Thea off guard, the nursemaid’s overgrown eyebrows rising quickly. “Who told you she was here?”

“I remembered,” hissed the former queen. Technically not a lie. “Is it her or not?”

After a beat, the older woman sighed and answered, “Not Eve, to see  _ you _ at least. Her mother.” 

Varia groaned, rubbing at a tight spot on her shoulder. “Which one?”

—

When the nursemaid Thea poked her head up from where she’d been sitting next to Varia’s cot, Xena sucked in a sharp breath and strode across the stone floor, her stomach twisting with conflicting instincts…  _ one _ of which was to throttle Varia for her pity party after all Xena, Gabrielle, and Marga had poured into her. The other instinct was, strangely, a twitch in her arms to drag her stubborn mentee into a hug. So, she compromised and did neither of those things. 

“Varia,” she greeted, her tone gruffer than she’d intended, as the warrior princess took Thea’s place on the low stool. 

“Xena.” The former queen looked guarded, tense, which wasn’t a surprise, but Xena would’ve sworn a smile tugged at Varia’s mouth.

They stared at each other, ignoring Thea when she scoffed and left, and it was Varia who broke the silence: “Guess you heard someone wants me dead. Again.”

“I did.” The older warrior nodded. She couldn’t deny that the childishly petulant look on her former protégés face was… nostalgia-inducing. Varia could break men’s bones with her bare hands, and she still had a mean streak of residual teenage helionism. “And… that’s why I’m here. We’re moving you into the Keep until we find out who’s behind it.”

“Seems like a message Thea could’ve passed along.” 

“Well…” Letting one side of her mouth quirk up, Xena shrugged. “Maybe I also wanted to have an excuse to see a friend.”

Varia looked appropriately chastened by Xena’s gracious answer, and some of the stiffness melted from her posture as her dark eyes flickered down, as if in deference. 

“It’s good to see you, Varia. Truly.” The older warrior leaned forward to clap a palm on Varia’s shoulder, giving the muscle an affectionate squeeze that also let her assess just how far the former queen’s physical shape had fallen. “You’ve been wandering for too long, kid.”

“Not a wanderer if there’s no place to call home,” murmured Varia with a shake of her head.

Xena brushed past the cynicism of that, unsure what she could say other than, “You’ll have your own quarters in the Keep. It’s nothing fancy, but it’s warm. And it’s the safest place for you now.”

“Who says it isn’t someone in the Keep who wants me dead?”

The older warrior tilted her head with a grin and a wink. “Remember how we got Morloch’s men in the cave?”

Varia winced, and her feet shifted, as if remorseful over the memory of the incinerated boots. “Ah. Great.”

“And that means, you better work on getting your fight back, quickly. I can’t be there to guard you all day and night.” Something flickered in the younger warrior’s expression, and Xena honed in on it with narrowing eyes, despite Varia’s clear attempt to cover it with a cough. “What?”

“I, um… I heard it wasn’t  _ you _ who saved me, anyway. Not this time, at least.”

_ Ah. _ The older warrior furrowed her brows. She wasn’t born yesterday. That stupid, confusedly hopeful look on Varia’s leonine features was one she had noticed being cast in Eve’s direction in those preciously peaceful hours before the young queen-to-be had identified the Messenger of Eli, neé Bitch of Rome. Both women were rounding on their thirtieth summers, and both were excruciatingly underdeveloped in this arena. Xena recognized it easily as something she’d dealt with herself, but she held her expression neutral, deciding it would be better to gloss over  _ all that  _ for now. She needed to do a little reconnaissance first. “You mean Eve.”

Varia swallowed, cheeks reddening, and Xena had to smother an eyeroll. The younger warrior seemed aware of her own absurdity, though, and averted her eyes, nonchalantly messing with a frayed corner of her blanket. “Yeah. She came back from the East?”

“She’s here.” The warrior princess leaned closer, waiting until Varia’s dark eyes met hers. “And yes, she did save your life.” 

The former queen nodded carefully. “Tell her ‘thank you’ for me. I would’ve understood if she hadn’t.”

“My daughter is a better person than that. The patients here are  _ all _ in her care, as far as Eve is concerned,” replied Xena, sharpening her tone. “But you’re just being self-pitying, and you need to cut that out, too. Doesn’t suit you.”

Varia gave a heavy sigh, a tiny sign of acquiescence, and Xena tossed the linen satchel she’d brought at the younger woman’s chest

“New clothes, new boots. That’s your first step out of this dark hole you’ve made. You’d be surprised how much it helps. Trust me.”

After long, silent seconds of staring at the bag like she wanted it to catch fire, Varia looked up at Xena and nodded once. It was, literally, a small gesture, but the older warrior knew that it signified an inner shift. Perhaps the Varia that Marga foresaw was still somewhere in there, lurking behind the melancholy loner’s veneer. 

When Varia stepped out of the temple for the first time, where Xena had gone to wait for her to change, she held her head a little higher. The outfit was a leather skirt in the style of her home tribe, feathered and beaded beyond what Xena considered reasonable, and a braided leather chest harness studded with brass rivets. It wouldn’t stop a well-placed knife, but any archer more than a few paces away would have trouble finding an open shot to Varia’s chest or neck. 

Next, Xena dragged her to a barber, who clicked her tongue and hemmed and hawed over Varia’s dark mane of tangles and knots, yanking her head this way and that, before throwing her hands up and taking a straightblade to the mess. Varia walked out with her hair just long enough to reach her chin, tamed back from her face with scented oils, and weathered some gentle ribbing from the older warrior before they headed for the Keep with the quartet of guards charged with their safe escort. Amazons gawked and pointed at the miniature procession, but no one threw anything at their former queen, including verbal insults, and that seemed like a positive. Hopefully. 

High in the stone stronghold of Pygela, Varia’s room was a modest one, outfitted with a bed, a wash bin, and a small table with two chairs. Most importantly, it was situated at the end of a hall, meaning any attackers would have to get through a set of guards outside the door with no chance to flank them, or somehow scale the outside walls of the Keep, rip welded iron from the window, and get to Varia before the guards came into the room. An assassin would need skills that very few in the world possessed to carry out such an attack successfully, so perhaps Xena could sleep a little easier now. 

And Varia, at least, had a cautious smile on her face as she sat on the bed, fingers tangling in the fox furs on top. “Better than a temple cot, that’s for sure. It’s… this isn’t a nicely decorated cell though, right?”

That made Xena pause, and she glanced out the door at the stoic guards, then back at the younger warrior. It could be an interesting question if you looked closely, but superficially, she had an easy answer: “It’s not a cell. Go where you want—but I wouldn’t push your luck, and don’t give your guards trouble. Kitchens are fired up almost all day. There’s a hot spring and training grounds. You’re going to be living a lot better than a lot of people in this city.”

The former queen‘s smile faded, and she cleared her throat. “How’s… all  _ that _ going? This the land of milk and honey yet?”

“Settling the city is… Slow. Uncertain.” Xena sighed ruefully. “But they’ll get there.”

“Well, I definitely do not envy the Council right now.”

“You and me both, Varia.” Chuckling, Xena nodded and headed for the door, appreciative that the younger warrior could joke about her fall in station. “Get settled in, send for me if you need something. And stay out of trouble.”

—

_ Something  _ was brewing in the dark unknown spaces of Pygela. 

The queens were hearing increasingly frantic rumors, some true, some not. Men disappearing in the night. Boys reporting threats. Many, if not most, of the original Amazons felt they should leave, regardless, which was a difficult sentiment to handle while trying to figure out what, if any of it, was representative of something bigger than accidents, angry individuals, and misunderstandings. General Andromeda felt particularly strongly that there was an amorphous danger on the horizon, which seemed simultaneously comforting and alarming to Gabrielle. She had no evidence to confirm or deny, and that was the feeling she hated more than a general sense of looming danger. That type of shadow was quite familiar to the Battling Bard, after all. 

While the Council had been worrying about currency, clean water, and sanitation… the city’s people had been drawing lines in the sand. Too many of them were moving past the initial euphoria of a place to call their own; now, they were wondering what came next, and when they didn’t find a clear answer, they were filling in the gaps themselves. Without a strong connection to m  _ Amazon _ as a unifying identity, many of the neighborhoods were becoming segregated by whatever tribal factor mattered most: Romans here, Elijans there, Spartans back this way, and so on. Gabrielle couldn’t even blame them, really. Setting up a system of rule was more painstaking than even the bard had anticipated. They were, in a word, overwhelmed. 

So for the first time since arriving in the city, the Council, as a unit, left their meeting room in the Keep and went to talk to the people themselves. It took hours, and then days, and a whole fortnight, but they persistently made their way through the streets with enough guards and fanfare to draw attention—and then they made their case. 

They chose the bard to deliver the message, usually standing on a cart or low roof, with Andromeda tossing her up to her place in the sun. Wherever the spot, Gabrielle’s words were the same plea: “We know you came here for a reason, all of you. Opportunity, freedom, strength. You probably made the journey because you’d heard stories of the mighty Amazons—and we still are. But for those who have always been our Sisters, you must know, and you must accept with an Amazon’s strong heart, that our people must change for our most important beliefs to survive. For those of you who are new… I pray you can believe me when I say that we are happy you’re here. We’re going to keep you safe, as best we can. We just need some patience. Compassion. Empathy. Rising from these ashes will be hard, and it will take time, but we can do this, together. We can create a legacy of our own making.”

She didn’t think it was her best work, but all the queens had agreed to the language, and responses ran the gamut. Negative, positive, bored, incredulous. Gabrielle just hoped that people would understand, if nothing else, that the Council understood, sincerely, the gravity of their position. The walking and talking was exhausting physically, the rejections weighing heavy on her mind, and Gabrielle spent most of her free time soaking in hot water or sleeping after the tour days. Xena did her best to be supportive, including some Aphrodite-worthy footrubs and ensuring the bard’s favorite sweet fruits were always on their room’s table, but there was nothing to be done to truly alleviate her pains… except finish their tour, getting the message out to as many people as possible. 

And when it was all over, Gabrielle slept for almost a full day, to the point that she was sore getting out of bed. With Xena out on the training grounds, the pain immediately sent her to the hot springs below the Keep. There were a few Amazons she recognized there, finishing up their baths, and they exchanged pleasantries as they passed. Otherwise, the torchlit cavern was quiet, and Gabrielle allowed herself an indulgent sigh as she sank into the largest carved bath, hot to the point of almost-pain at first touch. Then, it melted into a heavenly embrace, loosening her muscles and flooding her brain with enough good feeling to stop worrying about the city, at least for awhile. For as long as she could just  _ sit. _ And breathe.

While the Council was currently maintaining a fairly impressive unity on the more difficult topics facing Pygela, she couldn’t help but worry that the day would come when that fell apart. If anything, their unified front derived, at least in part, from the fact that they hadn’t taken any drastic actions yet—no removals, no punishments. That type of ambivalence couldn’t go on forever, though. Not if they wanted to maintain their rule and actually have people follow their laws. Voluntarily. But increasingly, Gabrielle had a thorn working its way into her side, rooting stormclouds and thunder: What  _ was _ their civilization? They were the Daughters of Artemis, but now that their patron was dead… what would become of the goddess’ more questionable directives and religious demands? Some would fare well with the brutal Spartans, but Romans and Greeks… Sighing, Gabrielle sank further into the simmering water, willing her mind to let go of these worries. For now. 

Before too long, however, the battling bard’s instincts started twinging, and she had to open her eyes again to sweep the room. Gabrielle  _ almost _ decided that she was just imagining things… and then she noticed a ripple across one of the other baths. There had been four guards outside the chamber, which wasn’t typical, but now that she was thinking about it clearly, the blonde tried to reason out why they’d be there… then she remembered  _ which _ four Amazons had been standing there. Based on that contingent, Gabrielle knew exactly who was ducked behind one of the rock formations. She slid around closer, clearing her throat, and shaking her head when that elicited no response. 

Eventually, she just tried: “Varia?”

An audible sigh, and then the former queen herself peered out from around her camouflage, looking a bit pale. Her sharp, nearly feline features were instantly recognizable, even with her dark hair shorter than it’d been before, and even if she looked uncharacteristically nervous, like a deer caught against a cliff.

“Have you been there this whole time?” was somehow all Gabrielle could think to say next.

The younger woman made a face as if admonished by the question, but she haltingly replied, “I… I didn’t realize it was you until, um… too late. I can go, if I’m bothering you…” 

Gabrielle blinked slowly, considering. They were adults. They could both enjoy the baths alongside each other. They didn’t need to talk. But Varia, former warrior queen of the Amazons, had just  _ hidden _ from her for what must have been half a candlemark, like a child caught sneaking. Admittedly, it gave her a little flare of empowered glee, and she managed to push that particular feeling back down and away from her facial expression. Varia looked sufficiently chastened on her own. 

“It’s okay.” The bard settled in her bath again, arms folded on the edge and chin resting on her hands. “I have to admit that I’m surprised. You’ve been in the Keep a fortnight, and this is the first time I’m running into you?”

Varia hesitantly relaxed her shoulders, muttering, “I hid some places I’m not proud of.”

Once the implications landed, Gabrielle surprised herself with a small laugh. She knew Xena had been visiting with Varia nearly every day since she’d moved to the Keep, cajoling the younger warrior into weapons training and subsequently setting the teenagers loose on her—evidenced by the dark ring under Varia’s eye at present. At least, Gabrielle supposed, the former was  _ trying _ to get back on her feet. 

When Varia cleared her throat uncomfortably, the bard went on, “How have you been?”

“Alive, I guess.”

“That’s fair. And it’s a lot better than too many of our sisters.” Gabrielle watched the intentionally inclusive language land on the younger woman’s chest, and she allowed herself a grin. “Varia… you’re so quick to punish yourself because you think someone else will. It doesn’t help anyone. Least of all, you.”

Brown eyes slid up to meet hers. They reminded Gabrielle of so many bad memories: Fighting to defend Eve. Xena stepping in front of an arcing sword. Marga’s dead body. Helicon. She could see the same dark clouds floating behind those eyes.

“I have a little experience with that shame you’re feeling. The way that it burns in your chest. The way you wished it would just burn your whole body up, rather than keep feeling that pain.” Gabrielle lifted her head from her knuckles, reaching across the carved stone to touch Varia’s hand. “But the sun keeps rising, and the only thing you can do is try to be better every time it does.”

“It would take a millennium of sunrises to make up for my mistakes.”

Varia was still technically grousing, but the bard could hear the slightest bit of concession in her voice, and she went for it: “Sure, what would I know, it’s not like my wife and I have a lot of experience in this area…”

That earned her a groan, but Varia seemed earnest as she replied, “I’m not saying I won’t try. It’s just… there are so many wrongs. I don’t know where to start. You and Xena, you two did so much to save so many people. I’m just stuck here in Pygela. Nobody needs saving inside city walls.”

Gabrielle drew her hand back into the warmth of the bath, trying to offer a similarly warm smile as she said, “You haven’t read my scrolls, have you?”

Varia suddenly averted her eyes, muttering, “I… can’t read Greek.”

_ Ah. _ Far be it from a small town girl from Potidaea to proclaim any kind of Foresight, but the storyteller part of her brain seemed to conjure the answer to this small obstacle, and the inevitable next steps, without any input of her own. “Reading is a great pastime when you aren’t ready to be around a lot of people. Xena’s never gotten into it, but… you’ve surprised me before, Varia. In good ways. And even if you don’t get anything about my scrolls, there’s a lot more out there. It could help through these tense days.”

“Okay. But if you say Thea is going to teach me, I’m leaving the city.” 

Chuckling, Gabrielle shook her head, “The nursemaids have their hands full as it is. I think I know who would be the perfect teacher.”

—

The Amazons had their holy places, to be sure, but Varia had never been in a library before. She’d heard the tales of the massive collection in Alexandria, in the land of the pharaohs. The library in Pygela wasn’t as big as those tales, not by a long shot, and the room was dotted with mountains of leather-bound tomes and rolled scrolls in need of sorting onto the dusty hardwood shelves… but the effect still somehow inspired awe as the former queen padded through the sunlit chamber, searching not for papyrus, but a person. 

“Messenger?” she called, cautiously, as she navigated the maze.

“Varia.” The voice came from the former queen’s left, and she pivoted on her heel. The speaker, of course, was Eve, Messenger of Eli, standing near a large table to one side of the room, more silhouette than woman with floor-to-ceiling windows behind her. The daughter of Xena and Gabrielle had more muscle than Varia last remembered, dressed in a linen robe and deerskin shawl, tucked into her braided leather belt. 

“Hi,” greeted Varia, hoarsely, when her eyes met icy blue ones. Her cheeks heated, and she had to make a fist to avoid nervously running her fingers through her hair, a new habit she was already trying to kick. 

“I don’t think I’ve heard you call me that before,” said Eve in a neutral tone, in lieu of further greeting. She closed the book that’d been on the table in front of her, but didn’t move closer. “Though I suppose anything is a step ahead of my Roman titles, hmm?”

Varia’s stomach twisted, but she sensed no anger or sanction in Eve’s voice. The Messenger’s expression was inscrutable, and for a moment, Varia wondered if she’d imagined the gentle, concerned version of Eve leaning over her cot and speaking in hushed, comforting tones.

But then she remembered that she’d at one point or another attempted to kill Eve and both her parents, and Varia managed a shrug as she replied, “How about I just call you Eve? Xena II seems a bit much.”

“I can work with ‘Eve.’ But don’t tell Gabrielle that you chose Mother’s name first.” Finally, the Messenger smiled, and Varia let out the breath she’d been holding. “It’s good to… see you, in one piece.”

“I should say the same about you. I hear the East has dragons.” Varia took a seat without thinking, awkwardly putting herself at the opposite end of the long table from her ‘tutor’.

“Their big cats have stripes, their bears look painted black and white.” Eve gave a kind smile, though the way her eyes flickered around the space told Varia that she noticed the strange distance between them. “They have tree creatures that look like a bear and a cat combined and giant scorpions that can kill you with one strike. But no dragons.”

Varia shrugged, wringing her hands under the tabletop. “I used to think the gods were just stories, too.”

She immediately regretted the reference, having learned about Livia’s long dalliance with Ares, God of War, before he turned his sights on the Amazons. He was an odd entity to have in common, and not someone she particularly wanted to think about now… or ever again.

So instead, the former queen shifted tact, covering her tracks by forging on, “Speaking of stories… I hear you are going to help me learn Greek.” 

“Hopefully. And maybe after that, Latin, Aramaic, Celtic. Whatever you have the patience for.” Eve gave a kind smile, gliding around the table and removing the awkward space, but remaining a respectable distance away as she leaned a hip against the hardwood. “Gabrielle said it was okay with you, but if you really would prefer someone else… I won’t be offended.” 

Admittedly a bit caught off guard, Varia stared at her for a few seconds, mulling the offer. She’d been expecting a spike of pain or anger upon setting eyes on the woman formerly known as Livia… but even now, it just didn’t come. Like when she’d silently slipped onto Amazon lands, Eve had simply breezed on by Varia’s guard with a joke and a crooked smile. She wasn’t entirely sure what she felt in place of the expected anger, so the former queen cleared her throat once more and simply answered, “This is fine with me.”

“All right.” Eve raised an eyebrow in an expression eerily similar to Xena’s rakish smirk, and pushed a pile of papyrus and inkwells toward her. “Let’s get started.”


	4. in the interest of poetry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An old friend comes for a visit, and Gabrielle has a lightning bulb moment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A smaller update! Thanks for being patient. I'm finally seeing the plot, hope you stick with me!

Golden bars of sunlight illuminated swirls of dust and horse hair as Xena moved through the Keep’s stable, along a familiar route. The Greek Amazons preferred treetops to mounted movement, of course, but the ranks of sisters from the far reaches of the world had made their own ways, based on their lands. Some of their horses were stocky, almost fuzzy things. A few warriors rode exotic deer with thick faces and velvet antlers, and others arrived on the backs of big, long-haired bovines that were too aggressive to put to grazing with the horses. 

But Xena… Xena had eyes for just one mount, whose lack of scary horns didn’t make her any less the perfect companion to ride into battle. Not that Argo II and Xena did a lot of that, these days. 

“Hey, girl,” greeted the warrior when the palomino poked her head from her stall, sensing Xena’s arrival. “Good morning.”

Argo whinnied, excitedly tapping her hooves, and Xena rubbed her long nose with her palm. If Xena herself was occasionally struck by nostalgic wanderlust within the walls of the massive city, she couldn’t imagine poor Argo’s frustration with spending most of the day in the stable instead of on the road, or grazing in forest clearings. They hoped to cultivate pasture land outside the city gates, but for now… Xena’s daily visits, with the occasional ride around the city, had to suffice. 

Once the feed bucket was full and Argo happily munching away, Xena offered a few neighboring horses handfuls of oats, and then a change in the air tickled at her ear. It wasn’t the whisper of movement behind her, but the portentous split second before—

_ “Wow… _ look at these digs. Very Caesar of you.”

A pop of pink light accompanied the smell of roses, and Xena turned to the deity with a sigh. “Aphrodite… fancy seeing you here.”

The blonde goddess flashed one of her megawatt smiles, wrinkling her nose as she looked down at Xena from her perch in the next stall, on the cloudy white stallion that belonged to General Andromeda. “Great to see you too, Xena, old pal, little buddy. It’s been awhile. I was wondering what you and Gabs were up to, and here I find you, rebuilding Artemis’ people? Not the twist I expected, I’ll admit.”

Xena closed her eyes, willing away her instinctual annoyance at the giggle goddess, and put a hand on Argo’s smooth neck to steady them both. “They’re not exactly daughters of Artemis anymore.”

“Are they not?” Aphrodite poof’d from the back of the stallion to the floor next to Xena, and the rose scent grew so strong that the warrior nearly sneezed. “I mean, not  _ literally _ anymore, but aren’t they still being all queen-exclusive here?”

“There are men in the city, for now,” offered Xena with a shrug. “Not very Amazon of them, but there weren’t enough warriors to stop them all.”

“Eh.” The goddess waved a dismissive hand dripping in pearls and yellow gold. “Artie, rest her goody-two-shoes divine essence, felt bad about her girls having to give up their sons. A lot of women left the tribes to keep them, you know? I sure would give up a leafy hut in the boonies for Cupie.”

“I… didn’t know that, no,” Xena admitted, filing that disclosure away for later discussion with Gabrielle, and she finally turned to Aphrodite with something like friendliness. “It’s… good to see you, Aphrodite. I didn’t know you could come this far south.”

Aphrodite’s jaw dropped, her fingers pressing to her chest in dramatic shock. “I am a  _ goddess, _ Xena. A god-dess, not some Hercules land-bound loser. Plus, the Romans are being annoying again, so I needed a little vacation. Where’s your bard?”

“Well, you know Gabrielle. She was up all night writing, so she’s probably still in bed. Usually gets up—“

Xena realized her mistake too late. She whipped around at the  _ pop _ sound behind them, and then a cloud of hay and dust rose into the air, accented by a very displeased  _ oof. _

“Gabrielle!” crowed Aphrodite, clearly not seeing the issue as she strode towards the pile of furs and confusedly thrashing bard on the ground. “Oh, how I’ve  _ missed  _ that beautiful little face!”

“Aphrodite, in the name of— _ whoever, _ have you lost your  _ mind?” _ snarled Gabrielle, finally untangling her legs from the covers. “Is someone dead? Someone  _ better _ be dead.”

Against all reason, the Goddess of Love froze midway to Gabrielle, still a ways out of arm’s reach, as though she were worried for her immortal safety. And against even more reason, Xena felt sorry for her—as much as Aphrodite grated on her nerves, the deity and the warrior princess certainly agreed on one thing: their love for the Battling Bard. She was truly going soft.

“Aphrodite just got a  _ little _ worked up because she missed you so much,” interrupted Xena, gently. She exchanged a silent, apologetic conversation with her wife when Gabrielle’s green eyes met hers, and some of the anger faded from the bard’s shoulders. 

By the time Gabrielle gathered her pride and picked the straw from her hair, the Goddess of Love was looking duly chastened, toeing poutily at a clump of dirt near her sandaled foot. At least, Xena would  _ tell _ her it was “dirt”, if she asked. She doubted Aphrodite would be messing with the clod if she knew what it actually was. 

“Aphrodite,” cooed Gabrielle as she opened her arms. “It’s good to see you.”

“Thank you.” Aphrodite huffed, but quickly melted as the shorter blonde drew her into a tight embrace. “That’s the greeting I wanted! See, Xena, we could—“

The  _ shick _ of Xena’s sword leaving its scabbard nearly startled all three of them, and Aphrodite stood frozen, again without reason, with her own arms still outstretched to threaten a hug and the tip of the blade touching her chest. 

“All right, all right. Grump,” sighed the deity, rolling her eyes while Xena put the weapon away, her point having been made. “Whatever, how about a tour? Show me what my sister’s minions have wrought.”

“How about some breakfast for me first?” Gabrielle threw an arm around her friend’s slender shoulders. “And then we can ditch Xena for a look around, huh?”

—

Being anointed “the” Messenger meant Eve had picked up a lot of tertiary, quite mortal skills, in order to be effective. It hadn’t been easy, but she wasn’t the first one to learn. The Followers of Eli who’d survived Livia’s brutal campaigns had done it before, and they’d taught each other over and over, as many times as it took to keep their beliefs alive, even decades beyond having had Eli to lead them. According to Gabrielle, the Followers of Eli, thirty years past the man himself, still held beliefs surprisingly true to what she’d learned as his direct student. From them, Eve learned not just the depth of their faith, but also how to share their vision with others in a way that would be persuasive, but not disingenuous. She knew how to teach, and from countless times witnessing others come to terms with the message of love, Eve knew how to be supportive without being intrusive, to make it about the God of Eli and the person in pain, only.

Forgiveness remained a key tenet of their beliefs, or else Eve surely would’ve encountered a reaction like the Amazons’ had been: calling for her head. It never got easier being told her soldiers or Livia herself had killed the father or sister of the person praying next to her, and though it was more difficult for some survivors than others to accept her into the fold, inevitably, they did. From there, it was up to Eve to seek mortal and divine redemption, if there was any to be had. 

And the tenet of forgiveness was also heavy on Eve’s mind every time she saw Varia, the fallen queen, walk into the dusty library where they held their lessons. Varia was a quick study when she concentrated, but also easily frustrated or embarrassed. The Messenger learned that she had to tread carefully, and over the first few sessions, she started to figure out how to prepare them both for success: a bowl of berries and sliced fruit, a tray of strips of salted meat, and a hefty jug of water. When Varia got something correct, Eve would surreptitiously put a treat next to her, a berry or a piece of dried beef, and watch as the distracted Amazon would inevitably stretch out her fingers to take the snack. Eventually, she just left the plate close to the warrior’s chair, and Varia would treat herself after every right answer, keeping her mood and energy up and her hands busy. 

Today was no different, and Eve considered the near-empty bowl as Varia began to huff through her readings. A couple stemless grapes lay lonely at the bottom, and the slate tray that had once contained spiced pork loaf and cheese now held just a few brown crumbs.

“To the end of Ulysses’ speech,” Eve encouraged when Varia paused. “Then I’ll stop torturing you for today.”

The Amazon nodded, taking a deep breath as she considered the scroll rolled out in front of her. Varia’s expressions during their lessons came strangely close to the faces she made in battle: a lot of bared teeth, brows knitted and shoulders tensed. The woman sitting across the table from Eve wasn’t her old self quite yet, but she looked leaps and bounds improved from her time in the temple. Her olive skin no longer read as pallid, having soaked up some of the coastal sun and weeks’ worth of good nights’ sleep. Her brown eyes were sharper, and though she walked with an unbalanced gait, her frame was filling out again from regular meals. Thea had done a good job setting Varia back on her feet.

“Okay,” sighed the Amazon, more to herself than to Eve, and she drew one finger to the inked line of symbols. “Here I am, at your mercy…”

“Princess,” Eve said after a few seconds ticked past; it was late in the day, or else she wouldn’t have offered help so quickly. Something about the particular passage was also tickling at her spine, making her fingers tighten against the table. 

“Princess,” repeated Varia, carefully. Her eyes flickered to Eve’s, then back to the page. “Here I am, at your mercy, princess. Are you a goddess, or a m… a mortal? If one of the gods who rules the skies up there, you're Artemis to life, the daughter of mighty Zeus. I see her now: Just look at your build, your bearing, your lithe, f-flowing grace.”

When Varia looked up at her this time, the Messenger briefly lost hold of her words, no matter how distinctly aware she was of her own awkwardness. This had been an increasingly embarrassing problem as the two women spent more time together, though Eve had barely so much as put an encouraging hand on Varia’s shoulder, and the former queen certainly hadn’t been giving off any signals that the heat rising in Eve’s cheeks was a reciprocal feeling. 

“Good?” prompted Varia, hesitantly, when Eve remained silent. “Can’t believe I blanked on ‘princess’ but not ‘lithe’. Psh.”

After clearing her throat a few times, Eve was able to reply, “You’re doing great.”

“Thanks for helping me with this,” Varia sighed, and if she noticed any strangeness on Eve’s part, she didn’t let on. “How come Gabrielle’s scroll calls him Ulysses, but Homer calls him Odysseus?”

“Because Gabrielle  _ actually _ met him, and that’s how he introduced himself.” Eve pushed her chair back, and the extra bit of space helped cool her cheeks. “Odysseus is what he’s called in the Athenian citizenry records.”

Varia tilted her head. “The Greeks kept records of  _ everyone?” _

“Only the citizens—men, who served their military.” Eve raised an eyebrow. A little bit of sparring was much easier than watching Varia’s lips form poetry. “Sound familiar?”

“What? That’s… that’s not the same at all,” growled the former queen, crossing her arms over her chest. “Artemis made the rules of my people.  _ Men _ wrote theirs.”

“Artemis is dead,” the words fell from Eve’s lips before she could stop them, and a chill of regret went down her spine. She’d gotten too comfortable. 

For several tense seconds, Varia studied Eve’s face, jaw clenching and unclenching… and then she nodded, turning her eyes to the table. “I know. But we still carry the lessons she taught us. That’s what makes us who we are.”

The neutral response, where Eve had expected something like  _ and your mother killed her, _ was mildly surprising, but Eve still chose the words for her reply with caution: “I don’t know if you got the same impression when he trained you, but most of the things Ares taught me, I still remember. They still ring true, for battle, but… He’s the God of War. There’s a lot to mortal life that gods will never be able to understand. Ares never taught me how to comfort a friend.”

That seemed to satisfy the former queen, and the corners of her mouth almost quirked into a smile. “What about your love god? Does he  _ get _ all this mess down here?” 

“I don’t know, yet,” said Eve, earnestly. “My life has been almost all war, too, until now. I’m still learning.”

The moment hung between them like an acid fog, swirling with the dark history that this conversation danced dangerously close to addressing. From the depths of Eve’s mind, she heard Livia laughing. She would never truly be free of the Bitch of Rome.

And just when she made the decision to inelegantly just retreat from the building, Eve instead took an instinctive step back as the air in the room shifted. Her first horrifying thought was that Ares had somehow been summoned by her words, but then the scent of roses hit her nose, and a bright pink light filled the chamber. 

“...can read my scrolls,” Gabrielle finished a sentence before realizing what had happened, and she startled, jostling the large cloth bags in her arms, stuffed with unidentifiable lumps. The bard had been mid-step when Aphrodite, Goddess of Love, had apparently decided to visit the library after a shopping trip, and Eve quickly grabbed her mom’s shoulder to stop her from tripping over a stack of leather-bound tomes. “You have  _ got  _ to stop doing that, Aphrodite.”

“Aphrodite?” repeated Varia, drawing the women’s attention. She’d pushed her chair back from the table in surprise, and her knees were tensed, but Varia had seen gods before—her eyes were filled with more curiosity than shock. 

The deity, decked out in her usual lacey pink brassiere and panties with a sheer cape, turned to look at Varia with a mischievous smile. “Hey there, handsome. Have we met?”

Varia laughed, her nose wrinkling, and Eve’s cheeks warmed again, but thankfully, all eyes were on the former queen. “I’ve met your brother. I’m Varia.” 

“Ah.” Aphrodite rolled her eyes. “I heard. He was quite cranky after you kicked him out. Good on you, girl.”

The Amazon got up to move a little closer, not quite sizing up the goddess, but not quite checking her out, either. Something of both. “I didn’t expect you to be so…”

Aphrodite tossed her head, obviously anticipating a compliment, and patted her perfect curls daintily. 

“...blonde.”

Gabrielle snorted at that, and the goddess stuck out her jaw in pouty disappointment as she shot back, “All right… I think that’s enough getting to know each other. Gabs here said we could have a day party, but wanted to invite you. So. Come to the Keep!”

Before either Eve or Varia could respond, the two blondes blinked away again, in a shower of pink light and a ghostly swirl flower petals. The Messenger looked at the former queen, raising an eyebrow. 

“I mean… I guess we’re done here, right?” said Varia, more brightly than Eve had heard her through all their sessions.

“Yeah. You go on ahead. I have some books I wanted to pull,” Eve replied as nonchalantly as she could, and she turned away from her pupil to pretend to search a nearby shelf.

She could feel Varia’s eyes on her back for a long time, long enough that Eve thought she might say something else, but then she heard heavy, stilted bootsteps heading for the door. When they’d faded completely from hearing, Eve dropped the act and put one hand to her forehead, the other on her hip. 

Teaching Varia had certainly been helping build the friendship that might’ve sparked between them, if not for Livia, but… there was still so much history. How could Varia ever truly trust Eve, after watching Livia kill her sister? Virgil had forgiven her for killing Joxer, as part of Eli’s Way, but even he never let her close like he did Gabrielle. His face never lit up in a smile when he saw Eve. That kind of joyful, affectionate reaction only ever came from her mothers.

So whatever ridiculous notions she might’ve had, blushing like a schoolgirl as Varia read Homer’s treatise on flirtation, Eve simply had to let go. Because she, too, remembered the way Livia’s sword had splattered Varia’s terrified face with her own sister’s blood. There was no salvation coming to her for that. 

—

Just one of the benefits of having a godly friend was that she brought all the food and drink for parties. Alone, Aphrodite’s very essence tended to put mortals nearby in a certain good mood, but the fact that she snapped her fingers and filled four banquet tables with a feast worthy of Olympus helped, too. 

It’d been too long since Gabrielle had spent a day off of queenly duties, and much of that, as of late, felt like simply spinning chariot wheels in mud. The city was beset by normal city problems—violence, theft, injury—which were completely abnormal for the Amazons. Their systems of justice were built on imprisonment and punishment, which was easy enough to do in Pygela, but they had no mechanism for investigation or democratic trial, not when that process didn’t involve one queen and the entire tribe. There would be no feasible way to make decisions like that, with the thousands and thousands of people within the city walls.

And so, as the citizens began patrolling their own neighborhoods and running their own orphanages, the Council had to find a way to rule, or the grand Amazon experiment was already over. Pygela was just another set of walls run by the team with the most swords. The Council could no longer avoid drastic measures… so the only question was, what was up first?

The bard had gotten a breather from guiding Aphrodite around the city, surfing off of the blonde goddess’ persistent bubbliness and people’s smiling reactions to her. If they weren’t careful, they’d probably drum up a new sect of overly-zealous followers, so Gabrielle kept it moving, for the most part. She did feel bad for quite obviously interrupting what seemed like a tense moment between Varia and Eve, but secretly, she’d just been thankful to not find them kissing between the shelves. 

And, as a connoisseur of stories, Gabrielle couldn’t help but ask Eve after a couple goblets of golden mead: “So… how’s Varia doing? You haven’t mentioned the lessons much.”

“I think she doesn’t really need me anymore,” Eve replied, suspiciously quickly.

They were sitting amongst other revelers, male and female, at one of the long dining hall tables, snacking on breads and cheeses between drinks. Eve was much more amenable to such things when a portal to Hell wasn’t nearby, though the actual celebrants didn’t behave much differently. 

“What about Latin?” 

The look in Eve’s ice blue eyes turned from casual to suspicious. “I thought this was just about letting her read your scrolls, about the Amazons.” 

“Yeah, but I’m just one bard. She should read more stories than just the Greeks’, or read the way those same stories are told by the Romans. It’s what good leaders do.”

Eve opened her mouth, and then closed it, and Gabrielle knew what she was going to say, anyway.

“I know she’s not a queen anymore, but… things are different now, and Varia could be a great Amazon again.” The bard’s words sounded more convincing than she thought she’d felt them, and Eve, too, looked dubiously at the table as the sentiment processed. 

“She said something interesting today, about the Greeks and the Amazons,” Eve said eventually. “Their citizenship is kind of two sides to a coin… the Greeks just don’t kick out the women. Maybe Pygela doesn’t have to keep kicking out men, either.”

Gabrielle eyeballed a nearby man, who on cue had risen from his bench to yell something unintelligible across the room. Not entirely different from Amazon warriors coming off a victory, if she was being honest. To Eve, she added, “The problem is numbers. How could we possibly keep track of this many people? Even just the women?”

“Isn’t that what mayors are for?” Eve picked up another chunk of the creamy, hard cheese she’d favored all afternoon. “Except instead of being separated by land, they’re separated by roads. I used my centurions the same way, to keep track of their men and our numbers, in case we needed to restructure the legions.”

That did strike a chord with the bard, and she took another look around the hall. Her first thought was to register anyone coming through for a meal, which would work, but might be seen as intimidating. Plus, plenty of the city’s residents visited the smaller mess halls outside the Keep, and even more went to the off-the-books markets and street vendors. Posting city guards in those places would cause issue with the merchant class trying to sell their wares in peace.

Plus, what they really needed was a way to get everyone on the same page in a short amount of time, and if they could, find a reason for the diverse peoples of Pygela to see themselves as part of the same tribe—Amazons. In some way or another. 

And it was Eve who offered the solution, offhandedly after a long sip of mead: “When things got hairy or my men got bored, we would hold a tournament. Mostly, we gave away the gold we’d stolen and had no plan to return to Caesar, but sometimes we’d bestow titles.”

“The fall equinox is coming up, isn’t it?” Gabrielle wondered aloud, eyes sweeping the crowds. The answer had been there all along, the one thing that all peoples had in common: love for watching people thrash each other for sport. 

**Author's Note:**

> yell at me on tumblr [trashyeggroll](https://trashyeggroll.tumblr.com/)
> 
> Comment or hmu on the tumbles for suggestions/prompts for this fic. I've never done a true slowburn before!


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